EDITOR, The Tribune.

Grand Bahamians were shocked after hearing news of the International Bazaar being in flames for the second time in weeks, which has led to speculations that an arsonist is behind the two fires.

The Bazaar is one of the most iconic structures of Freeport City; and is to Freeport what the Washington Monument is to Washington, DC, and the Statue of Liberty is to New York City.

The building is a dilapidated eyesore. Making matters worse is the Bazaar’s location near the equally dilapidated Royal Oasis Resort buildings and the apparently abandoned Casa Bahama, Club Amnesia and Captain Kenny’s buildings.

On Xanadu Beach - some miles away from the International Bazaar - is the dilapidated Xanadu Beach Resort, which is another eyesore.

On Pioneer’s Way, Freeport residents cannot avoid seeing the dilapidated Jasmine Gardens Apartment Complex.

Casa Bahama is located on East Mall Drive, which leads, in a northerly direction, to Independence Circle, where the deteriorating structures of the Grand Bahama International Airport, on Grand Bahama Highway and Queen’s Cove Road, are located.

Garden Villas and Coral Gardens are the two well-known ghettos of Freeport.

However, it can be argued that the badly dilapidated apartments on Hudson Avenue and Drake Avenue have turned that area into Freeport’s third ghetto.

Since the demise of Edward St George in late 2004, Freeport hasn’t attracted a touristic investment on the scale of Atlantis on Paradise Island and Baha Mar on Cable Beach, Nassau.

I’ve argued in this space in the past that Freeport is now lagging behind Marsh Harbour in Abaco (at least before Hurricane Dorian), Alice Town, Bimini and Georgetown, Exuma.

Had it not been for Freeport’s industrial sector, Grand Bahama would’ve been just another Out Island like Mayaguana, Crooked Island, Rum Cay, San Salvador, Long Island and Andros.

When the late Wallace Groves signed the Hawksbill Creek Agreement with the White Bahamian government in 1955, he probably envisaged Freeport surpassing Nassau as the capital city within a few decades of its signing.

With the advent of The King’s Inn in the 1960s or thereabouts, Groves’ dream was becoming a reality.

Freeport historians, however, have often noted that Sir Lynden O. Pindling’s famed “Bend or Break” speech at the official opening of BORCO in 1969 was the beginning of the end of the Magic City.

Hundreds of successful white expatriates, whose industriousness and international connections helped to fuel the prosperity Freeport was enjoying, fled Grand Bahama, fearing that the newly installed Black Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) government would implement policies similar to what Black governments had implemented in post-colonial Africa.

Several cases in point would be Idi Amin in Uganda, Robert Mugabe in Rhodesia (or Zimbabwe) and the African National Congress government in South Africa although these events occurred years after Pindling unseated the United Bahamian Party and Sir Roland Symonette.

This fear was fueled by the Black Power rhetoric of certain radical PLP elements ahead of the historic January 10, 1967 general election, which ushered in majority rule.

Whatever the merits of this decades-old narrative, one is hard-pressed to explain away Freeport’s perennial economic recession, with its intermittent economic spurts. Freeport needs sustainable economic growth similar to New Providence’s.

Considering the dismal state of Freeport and Grand Bahama 66 years since the signing of the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, Groves must now be turning over in his grave.

KEVIN EVANS

Freeport, Grand Bahama.

December 9, 2021.